Telephone handsets, particularly for use in portable or mobile telephone systems, include an extraordinary number of components in a relatively confined space. The handset includes a microphone unit, a speaker unit, a dialing system, antenna components, various circuitry including suppressing circuits, and a variety of related interconnecting components. The handset also may include a DC receptacle and, if the handset is in a portable or mobile system, battery and battery charging circuits. Connectors may be needed for any or all of these components and systems. It readily can be understood that this is a relatively large number of components, systems and connectors to be incorporated into a relatively small apparatus. Yet, there is an ever-increasing desire to further miniaturize telephone handsets, particularly mobile telephone handsets, and this creates considerable design problems due to extremely limited space availability.
The invention herein addresses one of those problems and, particularly, in making accommodation for the microphone of the telephone handset. Typically, the microphone is part of its own unit, including its electrical connector and an arrangement to mount the microphone in proximity to a small circuit board within the handset. In other words, the microphone requires its own "real estate" within the overall handset apparatus.
A typical telephone handset, on the other hand, has a main connector which includes various components such as the signal terminals, battery terminals, DC plug terminals, circuit boardlocks and the like. The present invention contemplates mounting the microphone and its respective terminals also on the main connector to save considerable space within the handset unit and still allow the microphone to be acoustically acceptable.